Need advice on hooking a SuSE 10.3 laptop to a Windows network at work.

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Need advice on hooking a SuSE 10.3 laptop to a Windows network at work.

I have been setting up a linux notebook for development. Monday I will be taking it to work to replace a window XP notebook.

At work is a typical Windows 2003 network with AD and exchange. I currently have my notebook hooked up to a Linux server at home, so I believe I have DHCP and the like setup correctly.

I would like to use Kontact to hook up to exchange, since that's what I use at home.

What I'm looking for is some last minute advice or suggestions as to the best way to hook my notebook up to a work network. I'm also going to be using the notebook at home, so I would like to make the change of networks as painless as possible.

Is anyone actually using a linux desktop at work on a Windows 2003 network?

YaST 2 has a wizard for setting up SuSE 10.3 to authenticate with an AD based network. A person in the netadmin group will have to join your machine on the windows side.

Ah, you mean the Windows Domain Membership in Network Services? Does this just modify the samba.conf file? I'm asking because I have a home network as well, so I'm trying to figure the best way to change domain membership when I go back and forth from home to work.

My home server is SuSE 10.2. I've always wondered why I have to use Samba to network with it.

Thanks! I was going to spend several more months figuring all this out. But I go live tomorrow.

To be able to log into your work network, your system may need some additional packages installed. There may be configuration changes in pam as well. I'm not certain if it will fall back to file authentication.

I haven't authenticated a Linux machine at work. I have to settle for using cygwin. There probably is an option in the login screen to log in locally. After configuring it to log into an AD network, look in the two drop down boxes on the lower left part of the screen. The one that has an item for remote log ons (XDMCP) may also allow you to log on to the local computer.

To be able to log into your work network, your system may need some additional packages installed. There may be configuration changes in pam as well. I'm not certain if it will fall back to file authentication.

I haven't authenticated a Linux machine at work. I have to settle for using cygwin. There probably is an option in the login screen to log in locally. After configuring it to log into an AD network, look in the two drop down boxes on the lower left part of the screen. The one that has an item for remote log ons (XDMCP) may also allow you to log on to the local computer.

Well, it's gone reasonably well. I have access to network drives and printers.

The first problem in the external monitor at work. It's a 19" 4/3 screen, while the notebook is the widescreen 17". There are only 3 resolutions allowed. With the 1400x900 I lose part of the bottom of the screen. The 1024x768 works ok, but it's really not big enough. I'm afraid that if I set sax2 to the monitor type at work, a Syncmaster 191N, I'll lose the screen on the notebook when I take it home, and not be able to run Sax2 to fix it.

Any ideas?

For some reason Linux isn't picking up the DNS server from DHCP. I can't ping workservername, for example. Is this normal?

Now I went the the windows domain setup, but I'm not really logging in to the domain. Konqueror makes me log in again when I want to get into one of the network servers.

I'm trying to figure out how to work this. One problem is that I have the same login name at work as at home, except with different passwords. Is it possible to have logins to two different domains setup. And I never did figure out why I need a domain on a linux network.

For your graphics situation you could either (backup your home xorg.conf file) rerun SaX2 or use the "gtf" program. It it were me I would use the "gtf" program to generate a modeline and insert it into the the xorg.conf file and then add an entry for that resolution.

gtf <x-pixels> <y-pixels> <refresh> -x

Example:
gtf 1280 1024 60 -x

The modeline will have a label like "1280x1024@60.00". Edit it to "1280x1024@60". The ".00" part has given me problems in the past. If you xorg.conf file has a "Modes" section, insert it there. If not, put it in the [Monitor] section. Then add "1280x1024@60" to the list of screen modes in the "Display" section.

For the name resolution problem, does your company have a local dns that resolves normal hostnames? Enter "nslookup <hostname>" or "host <hostname>" to find out. If it does, then look at the /etc/resolv.conf, /etc/hosts.conf and the /etc/nsswitch.conf config files. You could enter in the DNS addresses manually in /etc/resolv.conf, however, I think that Microsoft netbios host names are different from FQDNs.
You may need something like

Code:

## /etc/nsswitch.conf
...
hosts: files winbind

and install nss_winbind if it isn't already installed. I think there is also nss_wins and nss_ldap. You will need to research this yourself and probably do more experimenting. The "Samba 3 HOWTO & Reference" guide should help as well. The pdf versions are supplied in by the "samba-doc" package. Look in /usr/share/doc/packages/samba/.

I have RCS installed. Using "ci -l <config-file>" is a handy way of making a quick backup and add notes to each version. If a change to a config file like xorg.conf has unexpected results, you can check out the old version "co -l <config-file>". I created an /etc/RCS drectory so that the the old versions are saved there reducing clutter.

For your graphics situation you could either (backup your home xorg.conf file) rerun SaX2 or use the "gtf" program. It it were me I would use the "gtf" program to generate a modeline and insert it into the the xorg.conf file and then add an entry for that resolution.

gtf <x-pixels> <y-pixels> <refresh> -x

Example:
gtf 1280 1024 60 -x

The modeline will have a label like "1280x1024@60.00". Edit it to "1280x1024@60". The ".00" part has given me problems in the past. If you xorg.conf file has a "Modes" section, insert it there. If not, put it in the [Monitor] section. Then add "1280x1024@60" to the list of screen modes in the "Display" section.

For the name resolution problem, does your company have a local dns that resolves normal hostnames? Enter "nslookup <hostname>" or "host <hostname>" to find out. If it does, then look at the /etc/resolv.conf, /etc/hosts.conf and the /etc/nsswitch.conf config files. You could enter in the DNS addresses manually in /etc/resolv.conf, however, I think that Microsoft netbios host names are different from FQDNs.
You may need something like

Code:

## /etc/nsswitch.conf
...
hosts: files winbind

and install nss_winbind if it isn't already installed. I think there is also nss_wins and nss_ldap. You will need to research this yourself and probably do more experimenting. The "Samba 3 HOWTO & Reference" guide should help as well. The pdf versions are supplied in by the "samba-doc" package. Look in /usr/share/doc/packages/samba/.

I have RCS installed. Using "ci -l <config-file>" is a handy way of making a quick backup and add notes to each version. If a change to a config file like xorg.conf has unexpected results, you can check out the old version "co -l <config-file>". I created an /etc/RCS drectory so that the the old versions are saved there reducing clutter.

Good Luck!

Thanks!

My xorg.conf looked a lot different. Plus it said at the top "Do not change!".

I backed it up tho, so I'm going to compare the old with the new to see if I can do something.

I tried sax -r, and it figured out exactly what I had and reconfigured everything. I was able then to disconnect the external monitor and boot up the notebook with just the LCD screen. Of course, the screen was stretched, to get the LCD to look correct I would probably have to run sax2 -r again.

The dns thing is weird. Konqueror is able to find every computer on the network, so netbios is running fine. And I home the dns resolves correctly.

I'm wondering why it doesn't get the DNS server from the DHCP at work.

I'm checking out the DNS and Hostname in Yast, hopefully it's in there.

Well, I was productive day one with my new linux notebook. It really wasn't any harder than breaking in a new Windows XP machine. I'm surprised more people here aren't running Linux at work. I seriously think KDE is much more user friendly than windows. Especially the ease in which fonts can be made bigger. And the way my apps all come up automatically. And the two desktops.

I somehow got DNS running.The only three problems I have is, first, krdc isn't quite as good as the Windows tsclient.

Kontact won't hook to the Exchange server. But since my notebook is a mail server I'm not sure if this is a big problem. I can send email from kontact. And I have to have a terminal server window open anyway, so I run outlook there.

And third, I have to run sax2 -r when I switch from the LCD screen to the external screen. But, my windows notebook had the same 4/3 geometry of the external monitor, so maybe I'd have had the same problems with Vista.

All in all it went much smoother than I'd been led to expect.

The very best thing about this experience, and I want to SHOUT this out to a certain neckbeard here, is: